


Bit Less Awesome of a Plan

by Elleth



Category: Stand Still Stay Silent
Genre: F/M, Injury, One Shot, Shippy if you Squint, Spooning for Warmth, Trust, book hunting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-04
Updated: 2016-05-04
Packaged: 2018-06-06 08:59:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,154
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6747523
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elleth/pseuds/Elleth
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sigrun and Emil go book-hunting. Things go boom.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bit Less Awesome of a Plan

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Jureeya](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=Jureeya).



> Study incentive/reward fic for Ju. :3

"OH NO YOU DON'T!" 

Sigrun's roar of fury is the only warning Emil hears before the troll comes through the door he's guarding and hoists him off his feet. His boots dangle half a meter off the rotten floor boards of the church back-building. 

The thing that's got him - it's tall and grotesque as trolls go, with skin flaps like wings along the arms wrapping around his torso and a face that's flesh grown like a crow's beak with teeth inside more than anything. It's smart enough that it came through the corridor he and Sigrun jerry-rigged with explosives without setting off a single one. 

And it's got claws that tear cold gashes down Emil's cheek and over his neck as it lifts him up like a shield before its body, and licks a sharp tongue down the blood, all rotten breath and slime and he'd shower in gore and teeth again a thousand times over if this - if the thing just lets him go. 

His head starts spinning. Blood loss, probably, Emil thinks, and that thought is clear as the crystal in his mother's favourite necklace that she dropped into their garden pond the night before the police showed up with an arrest warrant for his parents. So much for learning from experience and keeping the explosives well away from the books, and still keeping safe.

The troll's claws dig in a little more. 

Sigrun's before him with her knife, all fury, nothing human, ducking blows and swiping back at the limbs that aren't clutching Emil. That moment the stories she's been telling of Valhalla's golden gates and being kicked out of them by one of her heathen gods or other with a hangover bad enough to end the world the second time -- he believes them. She really is the Valkyrie she's named for. 

And she can't get at the troll, not while it has him. 

Is he screaming? He thinks he's screaming. He's not sure what he's screaming, but he sees Sigrun still and nod, and her eyes go very calm. She sheathes her knife. 

Then she slams full-body into him, into the troll, and sends all three of them flying into the corridor, and they go sprawling. Sigrun's on top of him, herself a shield as she pulls his head to cover below her. The troll's still under him.

The world grinds to a halt as Emil hears the _click_ of a booby trap, and then it blows sky-high. 

* * * 

When he wakes, his ears are ringing and he cannot move. He's not sure where he is - it's dark, it's damp and smells like rot and smoke. Everything is pain, there's not a single spot on him that doesn't hurt. He's cold, too. Icy. This isn't - anything at all like Valhalla. Maybe Sigrun blew them straight to Hel? 

It'd figure, he didn't quite go down fighting. It would just be his luck, to die while screaming and to go for - well, not so much eternal damnation, but proof that he's nothing special. 

Except… there's something behind him, arms crossed against his chest - the troll, he thinks at first, it's still got him, but when his eyes become accustomed to the darkness, only dim light falling through a hole in the ceiling way above him - it's normal human hands. Bloody and torn, but normal hands in shreds of fabric that used to be black gloves. Someone's body is breathing shallowly, spooned tight and warm against his back, and there is something stiff and heavy pressed against his cheek and neck to stem the bleeding - the tatters of her coat, he thinks. 

"Sigrun?" he rasps. Even the two syllables of her name hurt to speak out aloud, but he can't quiet the panic rising raw inside him. What if she's hurt, or dying? 

_"Sigrun, wake up?"_

Her voice comes as low and painful as his feels. "Hey kid, happy birthday. Bit less awesome of a plan you had there, but calm down. Don't move. I _think_ we're still alive. Just gotta last until the others get us out. Can you do that?" 

"Y-yeah." He wants to faint dead away again, just from relief, closes his eyes and melts against Sigrun's warmth. Only a matter of time until the others find them, he trusts her on this. It's gonna be okay, at least as long as she is there.

"Good. You do that, you hang on. Stay awake. Can't have you skipping out on me now, did you see the library they've got back there? And we didn't blow that up, I don't think. Golden letters, that stuff must be way fancy, even if it's old-world religion weirdness. We gotta make a ton of money with those things. That's a thing worth living for. Gonna blow that on some treats for us, yeah?" 

"Treats?"

" _Fancy_ treats."

"Okay, _fancy_ treats." He has no idea what she's talking about, not even sure he's understood her right through the aftershocks of the explosion blast that blew them down into this cellar. "Like this?" 

Sigrun rasps out a laugh, bumping her chest against his back. "Sure. But let's go somewhere more fancy for the cuddling, then, yeah? And no explosions." 

"Sounds good. Good to hang on for." 

Her nose nudges the back of his head. Matted as it feels, his hair must be a mess. 

"Good man. And now you listen to my voice, I don't want you falling asleep on me here. Captain's orders. Too boring to pass the time without someone to talk to, and that troll is in bits and pieces, I don't think it'll reply. Okay, Emil? You listen hard, might just learn some things…" 

He passes out again after all, halfway through a story about teenage Sigrun on a dare involving cheese, a snowman and her father's underwear. Some time after, there's a vague feeling that he's being moved, and he thinks he hears her yelling over Mikkel's Danish gibberish. 

He comes to in the tank, in his own bunk, in a cast that feels like it's crushing his chest, and bandages everywhere, but his head is clear and some of the hurt is gone. And there's warmth behind him, arms around him, and a strained voice prattling.

"That was my best and funnest story, and you have the nerve to fall asleep! You gave me a fright there. I should kick you off my team for that, or at least demote your ass from right-hand warrior to latrine duty, but I guess it was a rough day, so I won't if you stay up to listen now." She pauses to nudge the back of his head like she did before; his hair is no longer such a mess. "So… I think you fell asleep just when Dagny got the cheese wheels and let them all loose on the road into town, and next you see my dad comes running with no skivvies on…"


End file.
